‘West does not want dialogue with Assad’

Damascus: A Syrian performer hangs from hooks while holding his national flag in front of a giant picture of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as a show of endurance during a pro-regime rally in Damascus on December 2, 2011. (AFP Photo/Louai Beshara) / AFP

With international rhetoric hardening against Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, peace activist Dr Maher Salloum tells RT the West is not really seeking a dialogue with the Syrian regime.

­A new UN report has put the death toll from the Syrian regime’s nine-month crackdown on opponents at 5,000. Talking to the assembly on Monday, Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, suggested Syria be referred to the International Criminal Court for investigation against possible crimes against humanity.

Commenting on the report, the French ambassador to the UN, Gerard Araud, called for further pressure on Damascus.

"It's is not just the humanitarian situation we have to worry about, but the risk that Syria slides into civil war and that the whole region is set on fire. We need a political situation and to put pressure on the Assad regime," Araud told French private television station i>tele.

However, the world community is not doing enough to ensure a dialogue between Damascus and its opponents, believes Dr Maher Salloum, the ambassador for the Universal Peace Federation.

“It seems that the West has been concentrating on the position that there can be no dialogue with such a president as Bashar Assad. I believe there is still a gap between the Syrian regime and its opponents within and outside the country,” he told RT.

The West is seeking a new regime in Syria as a tool to implement its own strategic interests in the region, he added.

“The regime is under huge pressure from the UN and EU and the USA, who have been taking all the efforts to denounce the current regime in Syria,” Salloum told RT.